The Way We Were (25 page)

‘I've got a message from Val.' He sounded rueful. ‘Debbie's phoned. Can't get in until lunchtime tomorrow. Val says could you open the shop in the morning?'

‘Sure. No problem.'

He hesitated and she waited. The silence stretching between them was far more eloquent than any words could have been.

‘Better take a rain check on that coffee. But thanks, Liv.' His voice was regretful.

‘See you in the morning, then.' Liv went inside and shut the door firmly.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

2004

Julia woke early the next morning. She rolled on to her back and lay for some moments, staring at the ceiling, thinking through the events of the previous day No revelation had been revealed to her at three o'clock, as Liv had foretold, but she felt too tired to pursue her anxiety: tired but not relaxed. Presently she got out of bed, pulled on a thin cotton dressing gown and went downstairs. Frobisher opened an eye and thumped his tail once or twice but showed no desire to rise. Julia pushed the kettle on to the hotplate, took a mug from the dresser and spooned in coffee and sugar. Yawning hugely she unlocked the back door and looked out into the early summer morning.

No wind stirred the soft, warm air; the sun had already risen high above Rough Tor. Julia made her coffee and, pushing her bare feet into gumboots, stepped out into the garden. She crossed the grass to stand beside the wall where she could look over the moor towards St Breward and, far beyond, to the white china clay pyramids behind St Austell. It was eerily quiet; no birds sang. On the slopes below Trescairn a group of skewbald ponies cropped the bleached grass where stunted gorse flowered amongst the scattered rocks.

Drinking her coffee, Julia allowed the peace and beauty to soothe her troubled spirit. She stood the empty mug carefully on the uneven stone wall, pushing her thick hair behind her ears as she bent to look at a small root of heather growing in the crevice, touching the tiny purplish-pink bell-like blossoms. Frobisher came out to find her, sniffing along the base of the wall where, earlier, a fox had passed. He disappeared into the dense shadow of the rhododendrons, and Julia picked up her mug but remained leaning against the wall, unwilling to relinquish this moment of tranquillity, remembering.

1977

A baby is crying: a thin, high wail that pierces the fog of sleep and brings Julia fully awake. She lies for a moment, with eyes closed tightly against the coming day, curled into Pete's comfortingly warm but unyielding back. As the months have passed she's grown more adept at blocking the unhappy memories that assail her awakening and, anyway, the baby gives her little opportunity for self-indulgent grief, but she dreads the moment of rising. The wails grow more insistent and Pete stirs, drawing the quilt more closely round him, muttering irritably. A door opens; voices can be heard and steps approaching.

Reluctantly Julia abandons the warmth and comfort of the bed, reaches for her dressing gown and is at the door as Liv arrives, portentous and reproachful at her mother's tardiness.

‘Zack's crying, Mummy,' she says reprovingly. And he's woken Charlie.'

‘Yes, thank you, darling,' answers Julia wearily. ‘I heard him. Be a good girl and go and talk to Charlie while I get Zack's bottle, would you? Thanks, Liv. You're
such
a help to Mummy.'

Liv bustles away, glowing with pleasure at the prospect of all the good deeds to be accomplished, and Julia gives brief thanks that the twins aren't jealous of Zack but have accepted him in the same spirit of benign indifference with which they'd welcomed Charlie. They are too secure in their own relation-ship to feel threatened, though they are occasionally irritated or bored by the younger ones. Starting school has increased their self-importance and they've developed a tolerant, world-weary attitude towards Charlie and Zack that amuses Julia.

As she picks Zack up from the cot, speaks to him tenderly and cuddles him, she can hear Liv's voice, schoolmistress-like across the landing.

‘Mummy will be here soon so stop fussing, Charlie. Shall I read you a story until she comes?'

Julia smiles. Zack lies in her arms, staring at her placidly, and her heart gives the little familiar tick of love and pain. Often she conducts unspoken conversations with Tiggy, as though the dead girl stands at her elbow, and in this way she tries to share her grief and guilt. The shock and horror of Tiggy's death are still vivid with her: postpartum haemorrhage. Everyone assures her that it need not have had anything to do with the accident and the agonizing walk back to Trescairn, or the long wait for the ambulance. Still, the guilt remains – and joy too. Zack is so sweet, especially now those early exhausting weeks of little more than a repetitive cycle of screaming, feeding and sleeping have given way to a slowly growing awareness: to these calm moments when he smiles at her or watches the other children; or simply lies on his back kicking and waving his fists. The Turk raises her head and is watching from her basket in the corner; she insists on sleeping there, just as she had when it had been Tiggy's room, and Julia hasn't the heart to forbid it. It is as if the Turk knows that this is Tiggy's child and that she is watching over him.

Andy appears, books beneath his arm and a hopeful expression on his face, but Julia shakes her head.

‘Don't wake Daddy,' she warns him. ‘Please don't, Andy. He's very tired this morning and he's going back to sea tomorrow. Take the books downstairs and we'll look at them while I feed Zack.'

Andy makes a face and disappears, and Julia follows him out and down the stairs, bracing herself for another busy day: breakfast first then the washing and dressing marathon followed by the school run. At least Zack makes certain that they don't oversleep – and for one more morning she can leave the two little ones and the dogs with Pete while she takes the twins to school. She knows she'll really miss Pete but a tiny part of her is looking forward to being alone, free from the strain of trying to be cheerful for his benefit. Immediately after Tiggy's death and her own miscarriage, he'd been a tremendous comfort to her; shocked at the news, he'd been sympathetic with her sudden attacks of low spirits and he'd shown himself to be a tower of strength with the children. But now he's grown a little impatient with her inability to come to terms with her grief.

Well, I
am
better, Julia tells herself as she drives the twins to school; but on this bone-chilling winter morning, with a drizzling mist obscuring anything more than ten feet beyond the windscreen, it is only too easy to allow the old horror to take control, especially as she approaches the place where she'd aquaplaned into the boulder. Resolutely Julia turns her eyes away from the slab of granite, wondering if she'll ever be able to drive this stretch of the road without the memories resurfacing.

‘After all,' Pete said, ‘with the benefit of hindsight we can all see what we ought to have done. You couldn't possibly have foreseen what effect that sudden downpour was likely to have on the roads after weeks of drought. It wasn't your fault, love. You did everything you could and stayed with her right up to the end. Nobody could have done more.'

He'd make a cup of tea for her, put her and the children and the dogs into the car and take them for a drive to the sea; later he'd pour her a drink and peel vegetables ready for supper or produce his one culinary dish – a curry. He is kind and thoughtful but he expects his kindness to show results.

‘There,' he'd say cheerfully, putting her plate in front of her, refilling her glass. ‘You're looking better, darling. The day out has done you good,' and, if she didn't respond with a positive assurance that she was cured, he'd look rather hurt, even annoyed, and a gloom would descend.

The trouble is, thinks Julia as she waves the children into the village school and gets back into the car, that it's all so complicated: a walk on the cliffs and a glass of wine simply don't compensate for the loss or do away with the guilt.

‘It's not just Tiggy that I've lost,' she cried on one occasion when he chided her for being morbid. ‘I lost my baby, Pete. Our baby. Can't you imagine how I feel about that?'

‘Well, of course I can,' he said, half awkwardly compassionate, half resentful at the implication that he didn't care. ‘But it was very early stages, wasn't it? Only a few months, after all. And we've got Zack. We have to think about him.'

‘I do think about him,' she answered quietly. ‘I don't have any choice but to think about him. But I think about my own baby, too. Babies aren't interchangeable, you know.'

He looked rather shocked and she felt fearful that this terrible thing might force a wedge between them. Her feelings alarm her: it is out of character for her to feel so heavy of heart and limb, so disabled by grief and guilt. However hard she tries to block it, that day last summer replays itself in her head whilst she finds herself working through a series of ‘if only' alternatives: if only she'd insisted that Tiggy had waited in the car; or if only she'd called an ambulance straight away instead of attempting the drive in the first place.

As she goes into the Stores to pick up the newspaper and some groceries, she is seized by a different kind of guilt: poor Pete must be heartily sick of it all. It was she who invited Tiggy to stay and persuaded Pete to allow Tiggy – who could never have guessed how crucial it was to be – to name them as her child's guardians; and he has accepted her baby uncomplainingly into his family In her remorse, Julia buys him a large bar of chocolate and then goes to the butchery department to select some fillet steak. Pete's last day at home shall be a good one.

He is stretched out on the sofa in the kitchen when she gets back. Zack lies peacefully across his chest whilst Charlie has dragged his Fisher Price garage close beside them on the floor and is running the little cars in and out with an accompaniment in his own particular Charlie-speak. Noses on paws, Bella and the Turk watch him, eyes flicking warily from side to side, as the brightly coloured cars come perilously near. He is enjoying himself enormously.

‘Here comes Mrs Geen,' he shouts – he has difficulty with any r-sound – ‘and here comes Mr Yed! Oh, dear! Oh,
no
! Bang!' Gleefully he crashes the two cars together; the two tiny occupants tumble to the flagstones, and the dogs wince and stir about anxiously.

Pete opens an eye and looks up at Julia. ‘I hope he has better road sense when he grows up,' he observes. ‘Hello, darling. This baby smells terrible.'

Julia dumps the shopping on the kitchen table and lifts Zack up, wrinkling her nose. “I'll go and change him,' she says, ‘and then if we're lucky he might have a little nap. Put the kettle on, Pete.'

When she gets back downstairs he's made coffee and they sit companionably together, listening to Charlie's running commentary.

‘Uncle Archie phoned,' Pete says. ‘He's offered to drive me into the dockyard tomorrow. I said almost definitely yes but that I'd check with you.'

‘Oh.' Julia is both relieved and slightly disappointed. ‘Well, it's sensible, of course, but I like to take you in when you're sailing.'

‘I know you do, love, but it's a bit crazy, all of you and the dogs getting ready so early in the morning, isn't it? Harbour stations at nine thirty, remember. We'd have to be away at seven thirty at the latest.'

Julia shakes her head. ‘We'd never make it. Although Aunt Em might come and hold the fort while I take you in. No, on second thoughts, it's all too much for her with school as well. It's probably best, if Uncle Archie really doesn't mind.'

Pete shrugs. ‘He suggested it.'

‘You don't regret it? Living this far out from the dockyard? It's madness really, I suppose.'

‘It's getting a bit dire when the boat's alongside for any length of time but that's because of transport. It makes no difference when I'm on leave, of course. We're going to have to think of buying another vehicle, Julia. There's no way I can leave you out here without a car, and for you to be ferrying me to and fro twice a day will be impossible with the twins at school and now with Zack.'

Julia thinks carefully before she answers. The subject is a touchy one; last autumn it resulted in a row. Back then, with the boat alongside for six weeks and Zack only two months old, Julia found it difficult to combine successfully her roles of mother and chauffeur. It was the first time that transport became an issue. For the whole of the last spring and summer they had Tiggy's van at their disposal but, though Julia valiantly attempted to control her feelings and drive the van, the combination of its size in the narrow muddy lanes and the memories it invoked almost overwhelmed her.

At this point, Pete suggested that the van should be sold and that he should buy himself a little sports car: just the job, he said cheerfully, for dashing in and out. Once or twice he came home late, and there was a secretive air about him that aroused all Julia's old fears. Angela dropped in one morning and hinted at meetings and conversations with him, so that Julia, still raw with her own grief, rather unwisely asked Pete outright if he were having an affair with her. His outraged response neither confirmed nor denied but simply implied that Julia was the one who ought to be ashamed for harbouring such suspicions.

The next week the boat sailed on a six-week exercise and in November Martin and Angela, with Cat, moved to Faslane. Until now there has been an unspoken truce on both subjects but the problem of transport needs to be resolved.